AUSTIN -- Black and Hispanic legislators, unhappy with the State Board of Education's attempts to revise history standards, said Wednesday that they could reduce the board's authority and even withhold money for textbooks.
Members of the Mexican-American Legislative Caucus and the Texas Legislative Black Caucus want the board to delay a final vote on proposed social studies standards that have spurred months of debate over race, gender and religion.
They said the conservative majority faction on the board has hijacked the process of drafting new standards for the state's 4.7 million public school children and has embarrassed Texas at the national level.
But the call by lawmakers for a delay in the process was not well received by some members of the board who say legislators are simply attempting to stall the process.
No member of the board attended the hearing that the group of lawmakers held Wednesday to gather testimony from educators and community leaders.
Some members said in advance that they would not respond to "threats" and planned to proceed with a final vote on social studies standards at their May 21 meeting.
State Rep. Trey Martinez Fischer, D-San Antonio, said that would be a mistake.
He said lawmakers will look into whether the board incorporated nearly 300 amendments without working in conjunction with teachers groups and the public.
This, he said, could mean that the board overstepped its statutory authority when adopting the standards.
"Nobody
in the Legislature ever intended for politicians to write our education curriculum," Martinez Fischer